Tag: terry chay

I still remember when we came up to Pittsburgh for your mom’s funeral. I was only 12 and I remember only one story at the eulogy—so this was good to watch too—and I don’t remember if you or Ken said it but it was about…

Of course it was in a larger story where the people in the audience had laughed, but that was the quote I remember.

I forgot that story and that was one my mom liked to tell her university students. It was in the part of the eulogy where I talk about my mom and me (the second story). It goes like this…

Mom had a heart condition which made life tough on her and she sometimes, when she was tired or exasperated physically, she’d say, “I’m dying!”

“Terry, I’m dying!” She exclaimed one time when I was seven.

I was feeling irritable that day. “Mommy! I’m dying; you’re dying. From the minute we’re born, we’re dying!” I said.

Ever after that, when she’d want to say she’s dying, she’d follow it up with that quote: “Ahh! I’m dying …(pause)… ‘Mommy! From the minute we’re born, we’re dying.’”

A long, long time ago in a crib far, far away… (a story from Auntie Gia):

Have a very wonderful day today. This is an indeed a special day. I remember when your mother and father brought you home from the hospital after your birth. I was in Pittsburgh helping take care of Ken. Your parents brought out Ken’s old cradle bed. It was small. Before they could put you in it, Two year old Ken stuffed himself in the cradle, lied down, sucked his thumb and would not move. Your mom enjoyed that moment.

It was the sort of place out of Dead Poets Society. East coast, jacket and tie required, all boys. The only way you could loosen your tie was if the teacher gave you permission to, and if you got caught with it that way between classes you got a disciplinary report and detention. The only way you could avoid the sportcoat was if you won a letter in athletics and had it sewn onto a blue crewneck by your mother.

Since the school was expensive, I took it rather seriously. All I did was study and do a head-down zip between classes nearly cutting off the kneecaps of the upperclassmen. I was, by all rights, the ultimate geek, and the middle school hovered dangerously close to the rule of 150 that seems to herald clique-formation.

Luckily it was just south of Dunbar’s number.

(Well that and my brother went to the school. When I got admitted, he forced me to exercise until he was satisfied I wouldn’t be put into the “PE” group. He also said that if he caught me wearing both straps on my backpack, he’d “pound on me”—obviously aware sibling physical abuse is a much more effective geek-motivator than being a social outcast.)

The other day at Lunch 2.0, I made the mistake of calling ValleyWag the National Enquirer of Silicon Valley in front of a Vallewag reporter. I was promptly corrected that it was the US Weekly. I guess that embarrassment was penalty for not paying attention to the mastheads when I’m at the supermarket.

Megan McCarthy of Valleywag. Don’t mess with these peeps—their keyboard is mightier than your coding skills.

Had I been thinking more along my sort of reading, I’d have called Valleywag the “Talk of the Town” of the Valley, but nobody actually reads that. If I said it was the “Page Six of the Valley”, you’d understand.

This is all a really bad segue into the fact that a friend of mine appeared in Valleywag recently in which they made a passing reference to a certain trait of hers I never noticed. And this reminded me of something that occurred in high school and why I have a natural defense mechanism to be oblivious to these things.

Here is the photographic proof my brother found that my Uncle Francis has a secret night job as Shin Joong-hyun, the Korean Godfather of Rock ’n Roll:

As my cousin, Chris, says, now we figured out what her father has been up to since “retiring.” We just got to get him to shave his head, wear and earpiece, and look pensive. 😀 (Knowing Uncle Francis, he’d do that too, if it meant a free lunch…Hmm, maybe the idea for Lunch 2.0 was genetic.)

Speaking of another Chris (and another lunch), Chris Jones mentioned that I need to include more essays from my Uncle. So, the same week last November my brother found Uncle’s hidden secret double life as the Godfather of Korean Rock, this essay was making the rounds in our family…